Lin Gao Qiming

Chapter 195 Business (Part [-])

In the next few days, under the management of Shen Fan, several identical courtyards were built one after another along Huifu Street on the wasteland next to Zizhenzhai.The courtyard wall is towering, and the courtyard door is closed.Inside are rows of standard factory buildings with brick and wood structure.The distillery was the first to be put into production. The technology of distilling liquor in the Ming Dynasty was already mature, and there were many distilleries in urban and rural areas, producing all kinds of famous wines and low-priced earthenware.

From the very beginning, Guo Yi had no intention of making wine from grain fermentation.According to Wu Nanhai's wine industry development plan, the cross-country wine industry will start after the sweet potatoes and sugar cane are harvested in large quantities.The cost of directly buying grain and making wine in Guangzhou is too high: there are many processes, and the water and koji used for wine making have certain technical requirements, which is quite troublesome.Moreover, the winemaking process will involve a large amount of grain transportation and the processing of distiller's grains-generally, traditional wineries often have pigs as well, in order to deal with a large amount of distiller's grains.Guo Yi didn't plan to open a pig farm in Guangzhou.

Therefore, they adopted a method of rectifying earth burning, which is available everywhere in the country. The process is simple, the price is low, and the batch is large.The soil burnt is directly purchased and then secondly distilled to remove impurities in the soil burnt, purify the wine, increase the alcohol content, and then make high-grade products.In fact, many modern brand-name liquors are also made by purchasing a large number of base liquors from small wineries and then blending them.Compared with the best distillery in time and space, Transit also has the advantages of quantifiable quality system standards, modern monitoring equipment and highly efficient distillation equipment.

The distillation equipment was disassembled after being manufactured by the machinery department in Lingao and then transported to Guangzhou by Dengyingzhou.Stills were made of cast iron, tin and wood.This still is much more efficient than all contemporary stills, it no longer uses direct heating, it is equipped with a through-type small boiler - a very simple atmospheric boiler made of pig iron and oil barrels, Water vapor is generated to indirectly heat the serpentine tube. After such rectification, the final product produced is a high-strength alcohol that is as clear as water and tastes like a fire. After two or three distillations, various creosotes The smell is almost completely gone, leaving a pure taste.

At the same time as the distiller, there were hundreds of small flat wine bottles, and the printed trademarks had already been pasted on the wine bottles-a woodcut picture of the military uniform of a great Han general on the top, and a Chinese character in seal script "Guo Shi Wushuang" printed on the bottom. It is marked in small simplified characters.The bottom of the trademark is: Proudly Produced by Zichengji.In the end, there is actually a nominal volume on the trademark: 250 milliliters.This seemingly superfluous approach was proposed by Xiao Zishan: the promotion of new weights and measures and Arabic numerals should be "moisturized and silent".Many of the new generations who grew up later learned about simplified Chinese characters, Arabic numerals, and weights and measures for the first time from the packaging of all kinds of "traveling goods".

After the wine came out, after several winemakers tasted it, they all felt that it was more mellow and stronger than all kinds of earth-fired wines on the market, but compared with those best baijiu, it was only on par, not particularly mellow.A winemaker regretted that with such a good steamer, he could make his own koji, and then find a good water to make it the best in Guangdong Province.Guo Yi smiled but didn't answer——Zi Chengji's wine is not in the wine itself, but in glass bottles——Guo Yi wants to take the high-profit gift box route.He ordered people to bottle the wine and seal it for use—the first batch of wine was small and would be used as a gift for dignitaries when the business opened.

Shen Fan ordered more than 100 gift boxes lined with brocade at a local lacquer shop.Each box contains two bottles of wine and two shot glasses.This idea was copied from the wine gift box in this time and space.It was absolutely unprecedented in the Ming Dynasty, and even the shopkeeper Shen was very impressed, saying that the proprietor was really generous.

Guo Yi, however, lamented the exquisiteness of traditional Chinese handicrafts. These lacquer boxes are exquisitely crafted and beautifully decorated, which he has never seen before—as far as Mr. Shen said, this is not a top-level work, but a batch of goods. That's all.

During the entire first month of the second year of Chongzhen, the Guangzhou Advance Station was busier than Lingao. It was not easy for anyone to open three shops at the same time.Guo Yi took shopkeeper Shen, Sun Chang and others to go out to visit guests every day, and visited in every way--it is very important to be courteous for newcomers.Everywhere they go, they give different gifts according to their identities.Liang Cunhou's family, who had given famous stickers in the market, also paid a special visit. Mr. Liang was very happy to see his business opened. In addition to receiving gifts, he also gave back the homemade roast meat.The close relationship between Dongzhu Guo and Mr. Liang made old shopkeeper Shen overjoyed:

"The proprietor is so clever, he actually got to know Mr. Liang." Old shopkeeper Shen praised in a low voice.

"Is Mr. Liang famous?" Guo Yi heard Liu Gang say: Mr. Liang is a son of a family, he is always eager to do good and righteous, and he is just willing to do good.

"The proprietor doesn't know?" Shen Fan was a little surprised, "This Mr. Liang Cunhou is the grandson of Liang Renpu, the former Shangshu of the Household Department. Gentleman."

The old shopkeeper Shen said that the Liang family claimed to be the heir of poetry and etiquette, and they had never cared about such things as jewelry and playware, so it might be impossible to do his business.But his family has a deep foundation in the local area, and there are many benefits to making friends with them.

"I will make friends with him more in the future." Guo Yi replied casually, and suddenly thought of a question, "Old shopkeeper Shen, do you know all the officials, gentry, and wealthy households in Guangzhou?"

"Ninety-nine are close to ten." Shen Fan was quite complacent.

"Write it down when I go back. I want to know all the officials in Guangzhou—"

Shen Fan laughed: "What's so difficult about this: I'll send someone to buy a copy of "The Gentleman" in the bookstore later. The Ming court has everything from a bachelor's degree to a low-level official, but there are all officials."

"Is there such a book?" Guo Yi was still a little surprised. Not to mention, in the original time and space, the book "List of Civil Servants of the People's Republic of China" definitely didn't exist—even if it existed, it would not be sold publicly.

"My boss, I'll send someone to buy it right away."

"No hurry," Guo Yi thought. Originally, the intelligence data team asked the dispatch station to collect the situation of officials in Guangdong. He still thought it was a huge project. Now it seems that it is not complicated-the information is sold publicly.

"Are there any more detailed ones? For example, those who used to be officials but are not now, but still have great influence—"

"There is also this one, the "Jin Gentleman Record" in this province."

"Okay, you will send someone to buy all these books later. Hmm," he thought for a while, "I still want to get the Chaobao."

"It's not difficult, just find a yamen and copy it out. It's just what the proprietor wants to do with this?" Shen Fan felt strange. If the "Jin Gentleman Record" is useful for business, the court newspapers are all court memorials and court proceedings, except Officials are interested, but no one will go to see it.

"The court's movements are also very important to us. Who knows what the court's plan is for maritime trade?"

Shen Fan thought this was right, most of the proprietor's goods came by sea, if the imperial court strictly prohibited sea trade, it would be a big blow to the proprietor.But this kind of news, as long as you communicate well with the book office in the yamen, the master or even the small officials, and leak the news in time when you see it, there is no need to bother to copy the newspaper, right?But since the proprietor has said it, just do it, it's not too difficult anyway.

"Master Li, who handles manuscripts in the governor's yamen, is very familiar with me, so I can give him some benefits."

"You just do this, report the cost to me directly, and don't spend it on the counter." According to the notice of the Economic and Financial Commission, the information fee of the dispatch station can no longer be spread in the operating expenses of opening a store, and must In addition, account management and accounting.This gave Guo Yi a headache for a while: In terms of favor expenditure, it is difficult to distinguish exactly whether it is for information or for business, and most of them are both.Finally, after discussion, it was decided to include all favor expenses in the intelligence fee.

"Yes, my lord."

Back to Zizhenzhai, the decoration of the shop is almost finished.In order to avoid objections, decoration is still a relatively traditional approach.There are three pavements along the street, square bricks on the ground, gray brick walls without plaster on the ground bricks, wooden lattice strips on the ceiling, four red palace gauze lanterns hanging, and a row of small glass lanterns bought in Yiwu.Surrounded by purple wood corridors, the halls are hung with poems, essays and paintings by famous local artists, with different styles, appearing luxurious and Confucianism-a closer look, the author is either a local family or an official in power.It is the three big characters "Zizhenzhai" hanging in the middle of the hall, and it is also the most popular staff member under Wang Zunde, the governor of Guangdong and Guangxi.In the middle of the floor there are red sandalwood flower tables, tables, Eight Immortals tables, and official hat chairs. The matching vases, screens, and ornaments are all high-quality goods—all from the Gou family brought from Lingao— ——The Dengyingzhou ship has been sending a large number of these items to Guangzhou every time recently. Firstly, the dispatch station can save money to decorate the opening of the store, and secondly, it can also take the opportunity to sell the stolen goods, so as not to pile up all over the warehouse.The trouble caused Shen Fan to murmur in his heart: Where did all these good things come from?Don't really get it from pirates?

The four glass display cabinets are located on both sides of the main hall, which are very conspicuous. To ensure safety, Guo Yi asked someone to make an additional copper railing on the outside of the large cabinets, so as not to crush the glass in case too many people onlookers.

The sales samples are all held in exquisite tray boxes of various colors ordered from outside. The bottom is lined with black, red, and gold velvet satin, and each cabinet is modified with two kerosene lamps hanging diagonally above it. With the integrated projection lights, all the samples in the cabinet look radiant.Shen Fan, who was used to seeing the dark and deep environment in the old-fashioned jewelry store, was also amazed again and again-Guo Dongzhu really had a genius pen.

(End of this chapter)